Elementary Algebra

With training in mathematics, statistics, and economics, Michael Sullivan III has a varied teaching background that includes 27 years of instruction in both high school and college-level mathematics. He is currently a full-time professor of mathematics at Joliet Junior College. Michael has numerous textbooks in publication, including an Introductory Statistics series and a Precalculus series, which he writes with his father, Michael Sullivan.   Michael believes that his experiences writing texts for college-level math and statistics courses give him a unique perspective as to where students are headed once they leave the developmental mathematics tract. This experience is reflected in the philosophy and presentation of his developmental text series.When not in the classroom or writing, Michael enjoys spending time with his three children, Michael, Kevin, and Marissa, and playing golf. Now that his two sons are getting older, he has the opportunity to do both at the same time!   Kathy Struve has been a classroom teacher for nearly 35 years, first at the high school level and, for the past 27 years, at Columbus State Community College. Kathy embraces classroom diversity: diversity of students’ age, learning styles, and previous learning success. She is aware of the challenges of teaching mathematics at a large, urban community college, where students have varied mathematics backgrounds and may enter college with a high level of mathematics anxiety.   Kathy served as Lead Instructor of the Developmental Algebra sequence at Columbus State, where she developed curriculum, conducted workshops, and provided leadership to adjunct faculty in the mathematics department. She embraces the use of technology in instruction, and has taught web and hybrid classes in addition to traditional face-to-face emporium-style classes. She is always looking for ways to more fully involve students in the learning process. In her spare time Kathy enjoys spending time with her two adult daughters, her four granddaughters, and biking, hiking, and traveling with her husband.   Born and raised in San Diego county, Janet Mazzarella spent her career teaching in culturally and economically diverse high schools before taking a position at Southwestern College 25 years ago. Janet has taught a wide range of mathematics courses from arithmetic through calculus for math/science/engineering majors and has training in mathematics, education, engineering, and accounting.   Janet has worked to incorporate technology into the curriculum by participating in the development of Interactive Math and Math Pro. At Southwestern College, she helped develop the self-paced developmental mathematics program. In addition, Janet was the Dean of the School of Mathematics, Science, and Engineering, the Chair of the Mathematics Department, the faculty union president, and the faculty coordinator for Intermediate Algebra. In the past, free time consisted of racing motorcycles off-road in the Baja 500 and rock climbing, but recently she has given up the adrenaline rush of these activities for the thrill of traveling in Europe. Jessica Bernards and Wendy Fresh of Portland Community College have worked extensively with the author team to create the How to exercises, new Geogebra applet exercises, and have made the assignments for the New MyMathLab courses.

Preface
1. Operations on Real Numbers and Algebraic Expressions
2. Equations and Inequalities in One Variable
3. Introduction to Graphing and Equations of Lines
4. Systems of Linear Equations and Inequalities in Two Variables
5. Exponents and Polynomials 
6. Factoring Polynomials
7. Rational Expressions and Equations
8. Roots and Radicals
9. Quadratic Equations
10. Graphs of Quadratic Equations in Two Variables and an Introduction to Functions
Appendix A: Table of Square Roots
Appendix B: Geometry Review
Photo Credits
Answers to Selected Exercises
Graphing Answer Section
Applications Index
Subject Index